Travel

Contact Jonathan Harrison, Alex Day, Andrea Mazzocchi or Katherine Thorn

We stock Western books in European languages, generally – but not exclusively – published before circa 1850. We are especially interested in early travel accounts – from the late fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries – in all areas beyond Europe.

Geographical regions in which we have tended to specialise include the Pacific and its surrounding countries – South America, the Northwest Coast of America, Japan, China, the maritime regions of Asia, including the Philippines and Indonesia, and Australia. Books on Africa, the polar regions, manuscripts and separately published maps are also handled.
  1. NIEUHOF, Jean, and Jean LE CARPENTIER (translator). 

    L’ambassade de la compagnie orientale des provinces unies...

    Leiden, Jacob de Meurs, 1665. 

    Lavishly illustrated first French edition of Nieuhof’s travels through China from 1655 to 1657. 

    £3500

  2. [NILE, Battle of the.]

    View 1st. of the memorable victory of the Nile, gained in August 1798, over the French by the British fleet...

    London, published by G. Riley, 1799.

    This view of Nelson’s victory at the Nile illustrates the opening of the action at the point where the Goliath, her captain having realised that the French were at single anchor, daringly sneaked his ship inshore around the head of the French line. It proved to be a decisive point in the battle, the...

    £750

  3. [NILE, Battle of the.]

    ‘View 3d. of the memorable victory of the Nile, gained in August 1798 over the French by the British fleet...

    London: Alexander Riley, 1st December 1800.

    This engraving depicts the dramatic escape of four French ships from their fleet’s crushing defeat at the Battle of the Nile, and the accompanying text recounts the fortunate circumstances which allowed the French escape. The four ships from the French fleet still flying colours cut their cables and...

    £600

  4. [NOVA SCOTIA.]

    A Fair Representation of His Majesty’s Right to Nova-Scotia or Acadie. Briefly stated from the Memorials of the...

    London: Printed by Edward Owen … 1756.

    First edition. ‘Résumé très bien fait de toute la question des frontières de l’Acadie entre la France et l’Angleterre; mais écrit au point de vue de l’Angleterre seulement’ (Gagnon).

    £750

  5. [ORAN.]

    Diario distinto di tutto il seguito per la spedizione fatta d’ordine della maesta cattolica di Filippo V. Re delle Spagne...

    (Colophon:) Florence, Bernardo Paperini, 1732.

    A daily account in Italian from 20 June to 8 July 1732 of the Spanish capture of Oran. The Moroccan city had been governed by Spain since 1509 but had fallen into Ottoman hands in 1708. This 1732 invasion brought Oran once more under Spanish control, in which it remained until 1792.

    £175

  6. OSBALDISTON, William Augustus.

    The British Sportsman, or Nobleman, Gentleman, and Farmer’s Dictionary of Recreation and Amusement,...

    London, J. Stead for the Proprietor, and sold by Champante & Whitrow and at the British Directory Office, [c. 1792-6].

    First edition, issued in forty-two parts, of one of the first sporting dictionaries. ‘The pleasure and convenience of being well informed in the Recreations and Amusements of a Country Life, are objects of themselves sufficiently interesting, to justify the Author in presenting this Work to...

    £650

  7. [OSBORNE, Francis.]

    Historical memoires on the reigns of Queen Elizabeth, and King James.

    London: Printed by T. Grismond, and are to be sold by T. Robinson … in Oxon. 1658.

    First edition of Osborne’s history of the reigns of Elizabeth I and James VI and I, two exemplary leaders of the Protestant English cause, with which Osborne was much taken in his works.

    £475

  8. OSTERVALD, Samuel Frédéric.

    Hn. Friedrich Osterwalds, Pannerherrn in Neufchatel, Anfangs-Gründe der Erdbeschreibung, zum Nutzen...

    Strasbourg, Bauer und Treuttel, 1777.

    Uncommon German edition of an introduction to world geography for children by the Swiss writer and publisher Ostervald (1713–1795), co-founder of the Société Typographique de Neuchâtel.

    £175

  9. OWEN, Robert.

    Robert Owen’s Journal. Explanatory of the means to well-place, well-employ, and well-educate, the whole population....

    London, James Watson, 1850-1.

    The first 23 issues of Robert Owen’s Journal, which would go on to reach a total of 104 issues ending in October 1852. Almost entirely written by Owen himself, the Journal was the main vehicle of Owenite social and political philosophy, directed to a general readership as well as policy-makers.

    £350

  10. PALMER, Robert Stafford Arthur, the Hon.

    A Little Tour in India.

    London: Unwin Brothers, Limited, The Gresham Press for Edward Arnold, 1913.

    First edition. Palmer was the son of the politician and colonial administrator William Palmer, Earl of Selborne, and was educated at Winchester College and University College, Oxford, where he took First Classes in Classical Moderations and Literae Humaniores, obtained distinction in the examination...

    £50

  11. [PAPER TRADE.] 

    Arrest du conseil d’état du roi, portant modération et interprétation de plusieurs articles du tarif des...

    [Besançon?, 1772?] 

    A seemingly unrecorded issue of this decree governing tariffs on paper and cardboard in Louis XV’s France, with no imprint but with the colophon ‘fait à Besançon le 18 avril 1772, signé, Lacoré’. 

    £175

  12. PAPINI, Roberto.

    Le Arti d’Oggi: Architettura e Arti Decorative in Europa.

    Milan and Rome, Bestetti and Tumminelli, 1930.

    First edition of a thorough and extensively illustrated survey of architectural and artistic styles and artworks from across Europe at the beginning of the twentieth century, compiled by the Italian art historian Roberto Papini (1883–1957), director of the Pinacoteca di Brera in Milan and later...

    £300

  13. PARK, Mungo.

    The journal of a mission to the interior of Africa, in the year 1805 . . . Together with other documents, official...

    London, John Murray, 1815.

    Second edition, revised and expanded. Park perished in the course of this, his second expedition to Africa, but fortunately he had earlier sent back his journal, which is the basis of this volume. It was edited for publication by John Whishaw, who contributed a substantial biographical introduction....

    £400

  14. PARLIAMENTARY RECRUITING COMMITTEE.

    Which? Have you a reason or only an excuse for not enlisting Now!

    London, The Abbey Press, 1915.

    A forthright call to the men of London, encouraging them to enlist for military service during World War One.

    £250

  15. [PASCOLI, Livio.] ‘Vilio LOCASPI’.

    Del modo di mantenere abolita la mendicità, discorso familiare.

    Verona, Mainardi, 1817.

    Only edition, very rare, of this proposal for the abolition of begging, and of poverty more broadly, by the poet and essayist Livio Pascoli.

    £285

  16. PEETERS, Jacob.

    L’Atlas en abregé, ou nouvelle Description du monde, tirée du meilleurs auteurs de ce siècle …

    Antwerp, chez l’auteur, 1692.

    First edition of a charming atlas, the best-known production of Jacob Peeters (1637–1695), a Flemish engraver and publisher from an artistic family – his brothers Jan and Bonaventura were both artists. The map of the Americas shows California as an island; the allegorical engraved title features...

    £2500

  17. PENN, Christopher.

    The Nicholas Brothers & A. T. W. Penn: photographers of South India 1855 – 1885. With a foreword by John Falconer.

    London, Bernard Quaritch Ltd, 2014.

    An examination of the successful studios established by John and James Perratt Nicholas and Albert Penn in Madras and Ootacamund. The majority of the photographs are published here for the first time. Also includes a copy of the scarce Nicholas & Co. 1881 catalogue listing over 450 subjects.

    £45

  18. PERRY, Matthew Calbraith. 

    Narrative of the expedition of an American squadron to the China Seas and Japan, performed in the years...

    Washington, A.O.P. Nicholson, Printer, 1856. 

    First edition of the official account of the naval expedition that established diplomatic and commercial relations between the United States and Japan and forced the end of Japan’s self-imposed policy of seclusion from the outside world. 

    £4500

  19. PERUCCI, Francesco.

    Pompe funebri di tutte le nationi del mondo, raccolte dale storie sagre et profane.

    Verona, Francesco Rossi, 1639.

    First edition of Perucci’s account of the funeral practices of Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Americas, extensively illustrated with engravings copied in reverse from Porcacchi’s 1574 Funerali antichi di diversi popoli, et nationi, inscribed by a Scottish antiquary and documented book collector....

    £975

  20. PINDAR.

    Ολγμπια Νεμεα Πγθια Ισθμια … Olympia, Nemea, Pythia, Isthmia. Una cum Latina omnium versione carmine...

    Oxford, E Teatro Sheldoniano, 1698 … London, apud. Sam. Smith & Benj. Walford.

    First edition thus, the variant with the title-page dated 1698 rather than 1697. The Greek text was edited by Richard West and Robert Welsted, and the chronology of the Olympiads provided by the Bishop of Lichfield. 

    £5250